May 28, 2011

6 comments:

nine months ago i witnessed my first silhouette (since starting the blog and becoming aware of the model) in medford, oregon and missed photographing it due to about five seconds of hesitation. since then it' been on my mental checklists of cars to find. finally stumbled upon this one on a meandering commute to work one morning and took these photos.

drove down to medford to visit the in-laws the following weekend, and what do you think was the first car we crossed paths with after exiting the freeway? yep.

i had the 1991 version. called it the "love rocket" next time you see one make sure you get a shot of the colossal dash board. you could fit at least 3 small children on it. i actually wanted to keep this ride and restore it all original but the frame was rusted out (damn illinois winters!) i now have a 2000 silhouette, not nearly as cool. i call this one the "love shuttle"

love this blog!! it is crazy how many of these cars remind me of high school and all the cars people used to drive. graduated in 1992 and had 2 cars in high school 1979 dodge ram charger and a 1964 4 door chevy impala "ida may" named after my great grandma that used to own it. bought it for one dollar from my grandma. it was like a living room on wheels.

I can't believe nobody has commented on how these things look like a dustbuster vacuum! Especially when they're white. The Oldsmobile Silhouette was definitely quite rare. I used to see lots of Lumina APV's and the Pontiac Trans Sport with its typical Pontiac lower body cladding (same body, same van, different badges).

These things had plastic body panels, so they never appeared rusty, though as mentioned, the frames and unibody are metal and will rust out! GM realized that futuristic look didn't go over that well in the early to mid 90s, so they went to the more traditional minivan style and back to steel body panels. I hear in Europe this body style was better received due to a similar Renault van that came out before GM exported these vans overseas.